Active Member

If you are not necessarily looking for the cheapest retailers, you could get all the advice, equipment and installation from many good retailers/installers. CEDIA accredited members are guaranteed to provide a good level of service. If you are buying everything from one company, you are bound to get a "deal" which shouldn't be that much more than if you buy all the pieces individually from the cheapest places you can find each item!

If you want to shop around for the best prices and install it all yourself, you need to provide more info to receive more advise from this forum! Such as how may rooms the system is to be spread across and weather you will have the same source playing in all areas simultaneously, or if you may be playing a DVD in one room and have TV, or just CD's playing in the other? What size screens will you be projecting onto and how much ambient light will be in the room? Do you want proper surround sound, or will it be a multi speaker "stereo" system? Do you want the speakers large, small, hidden? WHAT IS THE BUDGET???

One thing to remember: If you have smoking in the bar, the screen and projectors will need cleaning at LEAST 4 times a year, so make sure you can get to the projector lens and that the screen is washable!

Standard Member

Ok, what we know so far (the bar is still in the design phase) is:
It's one single area approx 160 sq metres (in a slight "L" shape).
The sound source will be the same for all speakers (either CD, DJ, DVD or Satallite)
The 8 main speakers are 4 pairs of stereo speakers (not sure if 8 will be appropriate)
We would want to project about 80 inch picture sizes
The main speakers would ideally be wall mounted
The ceiling height is about 2.5 metres
The ambient lighting when using the projectors would be low

We are looking to buy a combination of new and second hand and will probably spend between £10k and £15k.

Looking on some web sites the Canon LV5100 LCD projector has had very good write ups, is a LCD projector suitable for bar use? What other things must we consider when choosing projectors?

Active Member

Do not know Canon LV5100, but will do a little research (can you tell me any websites etc)? I would look into getting PJ's with quite high brightness if you think that you may use them in the day (1000 min ansi lumens) for football/MTV etc? Also try to get ones that have long lasting bulbs (2000 hrs min) to save cost and hassle! If you let me know the budget for the two projectors I'll make some suggestions? Sanyo (and their clones) are generally good for LCD, but the models I am thinking of are quite bulky (approx 15"x 11" x 8"). If you want smaller models, there are some decent LCD's, but DLP's are a lot smaller!

Use pull down (roller type) screens (electric would be good), this way you can roll them back in when not in use and protect them from smoke! I assume you meant 80" diagonally? Da-Lite and Draper are good quality, but not too expensive compared to Stewart or Vu-Tec. direkt2u.co.uk sel Da-Lite screens.

Will you ever require Dolby Digital or DTS surround (for DVD movies), or will you only require stereo? If you want to produce a "full" sound (ie pumping tunes etc!), you will require "full range" speakers or a couple of SUBS! There are many amplification methods, but in any case you will require 8 channels of power.

For CD and DVD playback, I'd suggest a Sony or Pioneer 301 disc changer (around £500), you could have 01 - 200 for CD's say, and 201 - 301 for movies!?

I hope I'm being a little help? I'm surprised nobody else are offering their help?

Active Member

I reckon an easy and cheap way to get 8 channels of stereo is to get two "high powered" (80 watt per chan) integrated amps which both can power 4 speakers. The use one as the "master" and the other as the "slave". Plug all sources into the master and take the "pre outs" or "tape out" to an input (AUX) of the slave. This will give you volume control over two sets of 4 speakers independently. You could then have amp 1/zone 1 (master) for the busy bar area and amp 2/zone 2 (slave) for the seated/pool area, where you may want it a little quieter? If the amps are behind the bar with easy access by staff, remote controls won't be required (just turn the knobs and push the buttons like the "old days"). If you do get amps with remotes, make sure you can also operate them from the unit themselves in case the remotes go missing, as I'm sure they will at some point!

You could get on amp with controls, and another without (power stage only), but this will probably be more expensive and you lose the simple volume control for 2 zones. Also, if one goes down, you can still play on with 4 speakers!

I would suggest that amplification is a good place to save money and buy second hand! I have a NAD 3240PE that would fit the bill perfectly (I'm not selling it) and you should be able to pick one (or something similar) up for about £50 - £80! It cost £400 new (7 or so years ago)!!!

Speakers are another good S/H purchase, as they very rarely wear out, in fact they wear in! If you don't need deep bass, but just want a decent Hi-Fi sound and don't want the hassle of looking around for S/H gear, you could try Richer Sounds. They are selling FEF Cresta 2's cheap (under £100 a pair) and others in the £60 - £100 price range that are pretty good!

Cheers Kane

PS. Where is the bar going to be (with town/city)? I expecta free drink on opening night!! Ha Ha.

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OK I'm not in the habit of giving away commercial info for free but today I am happy...

Here are three top tips I've learnt from experience....

1: Don't put equipment under or behind bar...It'll get wet/damaged/ruined

2: Wire the system in MONO, particularily if you are not using lots of speakers in one area. No-one will notice and you'll get a more consistent performance...Ie you wont get folk asking to turn it up as they can't hear singer (when it's the beatles and John is singing out right channel and they are under left speaker....don't laugh this is what happens...all the time)

3: The area around the projector...MAKE IT VERY DARK painted. Almost like a black hole. Just do it around where the screen is to near front of projector. You'll find that even in higher light times it'll be much easier to see the screen than if you don't!

OK SOME more....LCD's will just get trashed in a pub enviroment. Smoke and dust gets in to the optical system meaning they need constant service. That's why they still use DIM CRT's for most installs. They are more robust...However, SIM2 have just put out their Pub friendly DLP with sealed optical path. It's gotta be worth a look. ReTrO on this forum did one on a club. PMail him and see what he thinks.

Lstly despite your best intentions this is going to get played louder than you expect so put in reliable over spec'd equipment.

Distinguished Member

2: Wire the system in MONO, particularily if you are not using lots of speakers in one area. No-one will notice and you'll get a more consistent performance...Ie you wont get folk asking to turn it up as they can't hear singer (when it's the beatles and John is singing out right channel and they are under left speaker....don't laugh this is what happens...all the time)

Active Member

I agree that Mono would be a good option. If you go the two-amp route (both with 4 speaker posts) as I suggested, look for ones that can be simply switched to mono. My NAD has a button on the front witch turns stereo input to mono output. Make sure though that this doesn't mean that the amp bridges speakers A & B together (to increase power), resulting in power being delivered to only 2 speakers instead of 4.

I am no expert like Gordon, who does this stuff for a living, I'm just an everyday enthusiast who is offering rudimentary options. I would agree that you should go for more power than you think you'll need, although 80 watts (RMS) of "proper" power per channel is quite a lot when multiplied by 8!

Keeping equipment behind the bar can be a bad move if it is put in a stupid place, but I think if you make sure it is behind a door inside a cupboard or something, there shouldn't be a problem!? On the subject of LCD projectors not being a good option because of smoke etc, I would say again in most cases Gordon is right (he should know), but you can get LCD PJ's with sealed light paths and panels as well as DLP's.

Feel free to say if I am speaking crap anyone, like I said, I'm just theorising!?